[Lexicog] Digest Number 474

[Claire Bowern]

> 
> I have been compiling a dictionary of Cebuano, the most widely-spoken 
> language of the Philippines, with help from some friends who are in the 
> business of publishing magazines in said language. We used Excel 
> before, but now that we have the ShoeBox program, we are planning to 
> convert our dictionary "database" which is in Excel.
> 

It depends how your excel file is set up. If each column is a different 
piece of information (e.g. one for the headword, one for the part of 
speech, etc) it's easy.

Backup the file first and do this on a copy.

Start by inserting blank columns between each column with information.
Then work out the shoebox backslash code for the type of informataion in 
each column (e.g. for the headwork it'll be \lx, for the part of speech, 
\ps, for the English gloss, \ge, for Tagalog (if you're using a field 
for this) \gn, etc

type the backslash code at the top of the blank column before the 
information. So, if your headwords were all in the A column before you 
started, you will have inserted a blank column to the left. Now there's 
a blank column in A and the headwords in B.

Now, fill down the blank columns (Ctrl-D) so that the backslash code 
appears before all the entries. Do that for each column.

Now save the file as .txt

Open it in Word. You'll see a tab-delimited file which'll have entries 
that look something like this:

\lx 	aarli	\ps	n	\ge	fish

You need to do two find-and-replace operations.
First, find

^t\

and replace it with

^p\

That'll put each of the fields on a new line, starting with the 
backslash code.

Then, find

^t

and replace it with a space. Shoebox can't read tab characters.

Save the file (still in text format).

Now, go to Shoebox and open the file. It'll ask you what sort of 
database it is. Choose mdf 4.0

Bob's your uncle!

Claire


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